


More Myself Than I Am

by stratumgermanitivum



Series: His And Mine Are The Same [1]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Hannibal's Questionable Decision Making Skills, M/M, Soulmate AU, Telepathic Bond, mild violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-14
Updated: 2018-07-14
Packaged: 2019-06-10 03:12:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15282330
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stratumgermanitivum/pseuds/stratumgermanitivum
Summary: Everyone has a soulmate. Someone they will connect with on such an intimate level that they are like one mind in two bodies. It comes on the cusp of adulthood, a shared link between two minds. It will start with feelings, emotions shared across the connection. Some people claim senses; smell and sound. Those who are thoroughly, intensely intertwined can claim to send their very thoughts towards each other, although it’s generally considered bad luck to use the connection to find each other sooner than you are meant to.It is a wonderful thing, to know that no matter who you are or what you’ve done, somebody out there will understand you. Or at least, it’s supposed to be.





	More Myself Than I Am

“They _ache_ ,” Alana had said, the one time they discussed the issue. “She- I think it’s a she, it _feels_ like a she – she’s always so lonely and sad, she breaks my heart. I try to send her as much positivity as I can, but I’m not sure if she’s feeling it.” She’d sighed then, pushing around her lunch absentmindedly, and then glanced at Will. “What’s yours like?”

Will had thought about it for a moment, scowling down at his own food. “He’s an asshole.”

\-----

At first, Hannibal had assumed the same thing everyone assumed: he was merely the older half of the pair, his soulmate had not yet come of age. 

Then a few more years passed and Hannibal realized the more likely truth, that he did not have a soulmate because there was no one who could truly _see_ him. By that point, he had killed and consumed the men who’d murdered his sister, as well as several others who had merely infuriated him. He was developing both a taste and a knack for it, and it did not surprise him that there was no one made for him. The people around him, with their vapid, stale minds, they would never understand what he felt when he sank his teeth into something that had displeased him. Nor could they appreciate the artistry he felt when savaging the streets of Florence. 

Hannibal was, of course, not at all bitter about the loneliness. He had condemned himself to a life of solitude long before the silence had been of note. He would be quite content to live out his days above and apart from anyone who might try to know him too well. 

When he was twenty-eight years old, Hannibal felt the first flickering of something that wasn’t himself.

\-----

Will Graham inched towards adulthood with a trepidation previously not found in his daily life. There was a mild distress, of course, just in existing; The very act of being Will Graham was an exhausting, terrifying state. This, however, was an entirely separate fear.

Will had already learned how to stitch together the crumbs people left behind. He could look at a man, _really_ look, and suddenly know a dozen things no one would ever tell him. He already had plans for after high school. Law enforcement, something that would let him put his talents to work. He’d be good at it, he knew, and not just because of the way evidence lined itself up neatly for him, but because he terrified people.

Will knew he looked intimidating, even at seventeen with a soft, smooth baby face. He was stern, closed off, and when he dared to look at someone’s face, it was like he was opening up their skull to bite directly into their brain. People tended to respond poorly to that.

These things all built up the completely irrational worries Will had as his adolescence melted behind him. Of _course_ he would have a soulmate. Everybody had a soulmate. But still, the fears nested deep inside his skull. He was too… scary, too weird. He’d never met anyone who could do what he could do, or who could see beauty in the horrors like he could. Everyone he knew was entirely normal. No one he could connect with.

Will had been eighteen for three days when he felt the first tentative stirrings of something that wasn’t him, a mild, peculiar heat of pleased pride, twisted up with irritation, and all clearly unrelated to Will’s Algebra homework. It was such a relief that he’d laughed out loud, alone in his room with a hand pressed to his heart, trying to hold the feeling close.

\-----

It came in the middle of a dinner party, the only saving grace being that it was not Hannibal’s own, and therefore less likely his faux pas would be remembered. Hannibal was in the middle of a very dull, very lengthy conversation with future pork loin when he felt it bubbling up inside his chest. First, a confusion, magnified by his own but certainly not _belonging_ to him. Then, surprise. Followed finally by an ecstatic joy so absolute and pure that Hannibal burst into a fit of uncontrollable giggles mid-sentence. He was absolutely appalled, once he could fight back the unwanted laughter. His face flushed as he cleared his throat, mindful of the curious, mildly offended looks on the faces around him. After all, Hannibal Lecter did not _giggle,_ and he certainly didn’t do it in the middle of conversations about Impressionist paintings.

“I apologize,” Hannibal said, as cavalier as he could possibly be given the circumstances, “You know how soulmates can be.” That got a few smiles, some nods. He was hardly the first to suffer an embarrassing mishap at the hands of a soulmate. “If you’ll excuse me.”

In the bathroom, Hannibal splashed cool water over his face and stared at his dripping reflection. The water didn’t help, of course, but the sensation was fading anyway, the excitement replaced by more everyday emotions that would be too trivial for Hannibal to feel. Hannibal was alone in his head again, and all he felt was _rage._

‘ _Why now?’_ He thought to himself, _‘Why a decade late, when I have waited- When I had resigned myself to-’_ Hannibal shook his head, gathered up all his fury, and _pushed._ He hoped his soulmate felt it. He hoped it _terrified_ them.

“I was alone,” He whispered, thinking of nights spent in mourning, of freezing cold night terrors.

‘ _I was alone when I might have needed you. I_ **_do not_ ** _need you now.’_

‘ _Eik_ _šalin,’_ He thought, purposefully. It was unlikely they were connected enough for his soulmate to make out the words, but Hannibal thought them anyway, with all his might. He’d long since left his mother country, but he fell back on his native tongue, cocooned in its safe familiarity. _‘ Eik_ _šalin,’_ He thought again, and felt… _something._ Just a flash, too quick to understand, and then nothing. Alone once more. Just the way Hannibal preferred it.

\-----

Will was just a tiny bit afraid of his soulmate. It seemed like nature’s cruel joke: give the creepy kid a creepy fucking soulmate.

Will still only got flashes, bits of emotion here and there, but it was only rarely anything pleasant. Unfamiliar fury filled him often, as did an excitement that felt almost condescending in it’s tone. His soulmate almost never seemed to feel joy untainted by some darker flavor Will didn’t recognize, and if they ever felt any sorrow or regret, it was always gone before Will could get a true taste of it. And of course, there were the words.

Will got very little speech from his soulmate, and was certain his soulmate never received any in return, but the words came regularly, whisper-soft and nearly muted by irritation.

 _Eik_ _šalin._

Will didn’t recognize the language, and with the soulmate connection, there was no accent to go off of. The words simply popped into his head as if Will had thought them himself. Will knew them so well he could trace the shape of them with his own mouth, like he’d spoken them his entire life. Still, the meaning eluded him, other than that they felt more and more frustrated each time.

 _Eik_ _šalin._

_\-----_

The next time Hannibal’s soulmate decided to make a proper nuisance of themselves, more than just a minor irritation, Hannibal had long since left Europe for America and taken up work as a surgeon. However, at the time, Hannibal was elbow deep in the organs of someone who was _not_ his patient, some whining, crying thing that had yet to succumb to the pain of Hannibal’s knife.

Hannibal felt the trickle of foreign sorrow at the back of his neck, and pushed it back with irritation, as he always did.

‘ _Eik_ _šalin,’_ He sent halfheartedly, though he still didn’t know if his soulmate was also Lithuanian, or indeed, if he heard Hannibal at all. ‘ _Eik_ _šalin,’_ He thought again, and this time heard in return,

‘ _What does it mean?’_

It crept into his mind, clear and unbidden, as if it were Hannibal’s own thought. Hannibal startled so badly that he nicked the bowels, putting an end at last to Mr. Overlook and thoroughly ruining the meat he’d intended to take. Scowling down at his ruined plans, Hannibal thought as loudly and forcefully as he could, _‘It means go away!’_ He gave the body another vicious stab, no longer concerned with precision, _‘Go away! Get out! You are not wanted in my head! I have_ **_never_ ** _wanted you here. If I could, I would carve you our myself. I-’_

‘ _Alright!’_ The thought seemed almost a shout in his head. Hannibal winced, dropping his scalpel into a pile of offal. _‘Alright, I get it!’_

Then, silence, more complete than any before, more purposeful. It was unlikely to last, no one could shut down their emotions forever, but Hannibal relaxed into it, welcoming the peace.

\-----

Will gained a bit of a reputation for being ‘cold’ among the other members of the NOPD. It was, in his opinion, extremely unfair. After all, it hadn’t been _his_ idea to go numb. They could thank his soulmate for that one. But it frightened people, how he could trace his way back through a suspect’s thoughts and feelings, and then turn to them with a hollow, empty expression. People hadn’t been this afraid of Will since high school, and he wasn’t pleased to deal with it again. There where whispers on the force, when they thought he wasn’t listening. People wondering when it would be Will’s turn to lose it and take innocent lives down with him. Someone who showed no outward emotions could only be a hair’s breadth from crazy, after all.

It wasn’t like Will’s soulmate was giving him the same courtesy, either. Will still felt flashes of him, mostly the anger and that condescending pride, but also, rarely, an elation that was frightening in its intensity. Still, Will did his best to keep himself closed off, though once or twice he thought he noticed the foreign words again. But then, it may have just been his overactive imagination.

Then, one late night at the office, Will was halfway through paperwork on their latest arrest when the tears came streaming down his face in rivers. He touched his damp cheek, startled, and his next breath was a shuddering gasp. His partner shared at him in obvious shock; no one on the force had ever seen Will express an emotion stronger than mild irritation, and now he was flat out sobbing at his desk.

“Uh… You need me to finish this, Graham?”

Will considered saying no, forcing it down and getting back to work like he always did, but then a fresh sob worked its way past his chest.

“Please,” Will nodded stiffly, pushing away from his desk and bolting for the relative safety of his car.

This was grief. This was a pure sorrow that clawed its way into Will’s bones, replacing the marrow with sharp, unceasing pain. And it was not his own.

‘ _Are you there?’_ Will thought desperately, _‘Are you alright? Are you hurt?’_

A moment of silence, stillness. Will’s breath hitched loudly in his empty car, fingers stilling on the keys.

‘ _Eik_ _šalin.’_

Will’s sigh was more of relief than anything else. He started up the car, wiping the wetness from his eyes. _‘Are you alone?’_

Another silence, this one more telling than the last.

‘ _That’s a yes, then_ ,’ Will sent, rolling his eyes.

‘ _Does it matter?’_

‘ _Of course it-’_ Will sighed again, shaking his head and collecting himself. _‘I know you hate me. I know you wish you didn’t have this connection, but I’m not leaving you to deal with this… with whatever this is, on your own. You don’t have to say anything if you don’t want to, but you don’t have to suffer alone, either.’_

There was a flicker of affronted confusion midst the aching sorrow that still reigned. Will took advantage of it to merge onto the highway without dying; it wasn’t easy to drive and chat at the same time.

‘ _Distract me?’_ The thought was nearly whispered, hesitant and uncertain and nearly drowned out by Will’s soft, hiccuping breaths. Will smiled encouragingly, even though no one was around to see it.

‘ _When I was seven,’_ Will began, _‘I kept a stray dog hidden in my closet for a week...’_

From that day on, they reached a sort of truce. His soulmate still didn’t purposefully reach out to him, and Will still tried to keep his emotions under lock and key, but whenever his soulmate threatened to be overcome by his grief or his rage, Will would tell him a story. It still wasn’t fair, but it was easier. Comfortable, even.

And then Will got stabbed.

\-----

The night Murasaki died, Hannibal stayed up well into the night, allowing his soulmate to tell him stories of Louisiana. Despite how the words merged seamlessly with his own thoughts, Hannibal still imagined he could hear the slow drawl that was sure to afflict anyone who could so easily drop Cajun French into their tales. It was unexpectedly soothing.

Later, when a clumsy waiter dropped a full glass of wine into Hannibal’s lap, and then dismissively shrugged it off, Hannibal found himself listening to the time his soulmate had- quite literally- tripped and fallen into a drug bust that had evaded the force for months. Clearly, they were establishing a pattern. Hannibal found himself grinning as he wondered whether his soulmate-clearly law enforcement of some kind- would be so eager to share details of his life if he knew Hannibal was butchering the same waiter while memorizing his soulmate’s favorite authentic gumbo recipe.

Hannibal didn’t share anything in return. Ever. Although he did occasionally send little words of acknowledgment, encouraging his soulmate to continue. He had no desire for his soulmate to know him, especially if they might then feel compelled to arrest him. Still, the stories did what they were meant to. Hannibal found himself waiting almost expectantly to be calmed whenever someone brought out the rage he kept hidden.

The night it happened, Hannibal was at home, alone in his study, reading. He was immediately glad he was neither cooking nor butchering, because when the pain burst white-hot in his shoulder, he jerked so violently that the book in his hands went skittering across the floor, pages tearing. On a normal day, he might’ve cared about the damage, but right now all Hannibal could think about was the sharp throbbing of his shoulder and the burst of confused panic spilling through the connection. Whatever had happened, his soulmate hadn’t fully processed it yet. Hannibal’s mind was flooding with terror. Some of it, he realized, was his own.

‘ _Are you there? Can you hear me?’_ Even through the pain and terror, Hannibal felt his soulmate’s shock at being spoken to, quickly overwhelmed by a fresh wave of phantom agony to Hannibal’s shoulder.

‘ _What’s happened? Talk to me!’_

‘ _He stabbed me.’_ The thought was dreamy and uncertain, the fear dimming. His soulmate was losing consciousness. The wound was deep, and through several large veins. Hannibal was halfway to the door before he remembered he knew nothing about his soulmate’s location, beyond ‘Louisiana.’ He didn’t even know their name.

Hannibal collapsed in the doorway, leaning against the sturdy frame and closing his eyes, concentrating against the sharp stabs.

‘ _I need you to stay with me. Stay awake.’_

A flicker of recognition, understanding. _‘Hurts.’_

‘ _I know, I feel it too, but you can’t sleep yet. Are you alone? Tell me where you are, I’ll send help.’_

‘ _Cooper called an ambulance,’_ came the foggy response. Officer Cooper, the useless partner who had allowed Hannibal’s soulmate to be stabbed. He felt a bolt of alarm come through the connection, and immediately tried to stifle his ire.

‘ _Good, that’s very good. You need to stay awake until they get there. Stay with me.’_

‘ _You don’t want me.’_

Hannibal did not have an answer to that which was neither a blatant lie or a confused rush of emotion. He didn’t want his soulmate to know him, certainly, to find him and perhaps trap him. But that was hardly the same as not wanting them at all. They belonged to Hannibal. They were a part of him as much as the beat of his own frantic heart, and he knew surely and suddenly that if they died tonight, he would be left with a gaping hole that would never fill, no matter what (or who) he consumed. Just like Mischa had.

‘ _I don’t want you_ **_hurting._ ** _’_

A fresh wave of pain and fear rolled through Hannibal. He gave up on words and tried to send forth calm and peace instead, neither of which he was truly capable of feeling right now.

When he was small, and still safe, there had been a lullaby his mother had sung to him, and then to Mischa. The words would mean nothing to his soulmate, but Hannibal could still recall the tune, the melody that had helped him drift off to sleep at night. He had never done much research on soulmates, had no idea if it was even possible, but he focused as hard as he could on the music, until he finally heard something else in return.

‘ _Ambulance. Safe. Want to sleep.’_ The thoughts were fuzzy, not with pain this time, but with the thick taste of a sedative. Hannibal relaxed against the door frame. Technically, they were not out of the woods yet, but judging by the placement of the pain and how quickly emergency services had arrived, Hannibal had faith that his soulmate would recover. It still made him anxious; Hannibal would much rather handle the surgery himself. It felt wrong to have someone else poking around inside his soulmate, but Hannibal would just have to trust they were in capable hands.

‘ _Sleep, then. It’s alright. You’re safe now.’_

‘ _Sing,’_ Hannibal’s soulmate demanded, so sleepy and childish that Hannibal thought fondly of long nights with his Mischa, so many years ago. That answered the question of whether or not he’d been heard, then.

‘ _Sleep,’_ Hannibal demanded in return, calling the lullaby back to mind with ease.

He slept there, much to his embarrassment and later soreness, right there in the doorway of his study, back against the solid door frame. Hannibal woke at least once in the night, reaching out through the connection until he could be sure he still felt the cloying fog, and then let it lull him back to sleep along with his soulmate. He didn’t wake again until he heard a hazy smattering of updates. _‘Stitched up. Not dead. All clear.’_

There was a terrible crick in Hannibal’s neck, not painful enough to travel like the knife’s pain had, but enough that he would regret it all through the next few days. He could not bring himself to care. _‘Let me know when they’ve released you,’_ He thought, stretching himself out, _‘Please.’_

‘ _Kay.’_

Hannibal had learned something important. He and his soulmate were locked into place. They could never meet, as Hannibal had cultivated a life that would crumble if anyone else were to find out about it. Yet Hannibal knew with a terrifying clarity that they could never be apart, either. The death of his soulmate would be the death of everything he was. There would be no turning back, what little humanity Hannibal had guarded inside himself would crumble into dust.

\-----

Will recovered, slowly but surely. His shoulder would always ache, on bad days, and some of his motion would always be restricted, but he could move again, get out of bed, go home to his tiny apartment. He was a little disappointed, honestly. Without the pain, his soulmate would stop singing him to sleep. It was the most wanted Will had felt in… well, ever, honestly. He wouldn’t begrudge his father the effort put into raising him, but he was not an affectionate man. Or a sober one.

‘ _You want me,’_ Will thought later, a little bit accusing, a little bit awestruck. _‘You’ve been lying about it, but you want me_.’

A spark of distracted acknowledgment, some frustration. His soulmate was busy, but Will knew he’d make time.

‘ _Can it wait?_ ’

‘ _I’ve always been waiting for you_ ,’ Will reminded him.

‘ _Then wait just a few more moments while I finish up these stitches.’_

‘ _Doctor or tailor?’_

A pause, that uncertain hesitation that always came when Will tried to get some information in return. _‘A surgeon. ER, primarily.’_

‘ _You could have patched me up. It killed you to leave it up to someone else, didn’t it?’_ Will wasn’t usually so bold, but the little hint of heat told him he was right. The longer they were connected like this, the more Will could pick up on even the tiniest flickers his soulmate put out.

‘ _A few more moments. Please.’_

‘ _I’ll wait.’_ Will would always wait, as crazy as it made him. They were connected, beyond just the way fate had aligned for them. Somehow, they both knew how to soothe each other, exactly what to say (or sing). Will had spent his entire life running from the darkness that trickled down the back of his mind, but he knew without being able to explain how, that if they were ever to meet, his soulmate would understand immediately.

A few moments turned into hours. Will had all but given up on waiting, curled up in bed with the lights out, when the response finally came, as bone-tired as Will himself felt. _‘It changes nothing._ ’

‘ _What does?’_

‘ _The wanting. I could want you earnestly, as true and fierce as a sonnet, and I would still keep us apart.’_

Will sighed, rolling from his side to his stomach to ease the pain in his shoulder. _‘I already guessed that. Don’t you ever get lonely?’_

‘ _I have many friends.’_

‘ _No you don’t.’_ Will didn’t even have to think about it. He knew it for a lie almost before the thought had finished itself. _‘You might have people you talk to, spend time with, but you’re… You’re like me. You don’t have friends. It’s just you.’_

‘ _...How easily you read me.’_

‘ _I was made to.’_

‘ _Yes, I suppose you were. We’re just alike, you and I. Matched in all the intimate ways that should matter.’_

‘ _And yet,’_ Will thought, with a bit of petulance, _‘None which matter to you.’_

‘ _On the contrary. I find myself drawn to our connection as of late.’_

‘ _Is that your way of saying you worried?’_

‘ _If I say yes, will you take the pain medication you were surely prescribed?’_

‘ _It’s hurting you,’_ Will realized, sitting up abruptly and fumbling for the pill bottle. He hissed as the movement strained his injury, pulling at stitches.

‘ _Mild, but bearable. Which means_ **_you_ ** _are suffering far worse, are you not?’_

Will stared guiltily at the pills, weighing the correct dose in his hands. _‘I take aspirin, if I have a headache. I don’t really mess with other things. Harder things._

‘ _You fear addiction?’_

‘ _I fear a loss of control.’_

‘ _And so our similarities continue. I much prefer to be in control of myself. Thus why it was so alarming when I felt you for the first time. But I assure you, a little bit of pain relief will help you heal. Take your pills.’_

‘ _You had to be a doctor, didn’t you?’_

‘ _I find the workings of the human body fascinating.’_

Will resisted the urge to say something smart-assed back, but only barely. _‘So, about your worry, then.’_

A sigh was not a word or a melody, but Will imagined he heard one anyway. _‘I did worry, yes. You are an…_ **_expected_ ** _part of my life. I realized things would be unpleasant if you were to vanish.’_

‘ _And yet you have no desire to meet me.’_

‘ _I have desire to spare, but twice the practicality. Well-suited we may be, but there is no room here for another body.’_

‘ _Great. Thanks for that,’_ Will replied, with more hostility than he meant to.

‘ _I suppose if I tell you ‘It’s not you, it’s me,’ that will only serve to irritate you further?’_

‘ _With insight like that, it’s no wonder you became a surgeon.’_ Will swallowed a handful of pulls dry, glaring bitterly at nothing.

‘ _There’s no need for rudeness.’_

‘ _Yeah, well, apparently there’s no need for_ **_me_ ** _, either, and you can’t get your way_ **_all_ ** _the time.’_

‘ _Charming.’_

‘ _Leave me alone. I need to sleep.’_ Will purposefully twisted his arm and hoped the pain was sharp enough that his soulmate felt it.

‘ _Very well, then. Rest.’_

The lullaby came anyway. Will tried to be angry about it, and was unconscious before he managed it.

\-----

Hannibal’s soulmate became a bit prickly after that night, but they couldn’t give Hannibal the cold shoulder forever. Particularly when Hannibal made himself so very charming, singing his soulmate to sleep whenever the pain kept them up, and sending soothing feelings their way whenever they were frustrated, returning the last few years of stories tenfold. After a few weeks, his soulmate finally settled into the new way of things, and though their stories never came as frequently as they had before, they did return. All in all, Hannibal was quite content with the way things had worked out, right up until it all flipped upside down.

Hannibal would have known Will Graham was his soulmate even if he _hadn’t_ done his research beforehand and found the articles about the stabbing. It was in his eyes, shadowed and avoidant, in the strong line of his form, tense with hidden potential, and every piece of him calling out to Hannibal’s very core. Most damning, though, was the flare of foreign rage that surged up in Hannibal’s chest during Will’s little tantrum towards Jack. Yes, Will was definitely his, though thankfully, Will’s defensive personality seemed to keep him from realizing it himself. Will was too busy being infuriated to see what was right in front of him. It was almost amusing how Will, who may have been the most brilliant person Hannibal had ever met, could be so blatantly oblivious when it came to himself.

The right thing to do, the _smart_ thing to do, would have been to turn Jack Crawford down and put as much space between himself and Will Graham as possible. It was already a tight balancing act, trying to conclude his meeting with Jack while humming for Will in the back of his own mind.

He didn’t do the smart thing.

Hannibal had spent his entire life carefully planning out each and every action. Killing Cassie Boyle and showing up at Will’s motel room with the cooked remains was done with a haste that bordered on impulsive.

Will was curt and brash, but Hannibal could feel the tiniest traces of pleased surprise at his presence. He enjoyed getting to connect Will’s emotions with the tiniest change in facial expression, all the while making sure to broadcast nothing that would give himself away.

“Or we could socialize like adults,” he told Will, keeping his pleasure confined to a small smile, “God forbid we become friendly.”

“I don’t find you that interesting,” Will insisted, ever the petulant child. Hannibal allowed himself to smile just a fraction wider.

“You will.”

\-----

It took awhile for Will to clue in. Far longer than it should have for someone whose entire career revolved around how observant he was.

The night Cassie Boyle was killed, Will’s dreams were flooded with foreign pleasure, condescending amusement. The next time it happened, Marissa Schurr’s body showed up. Will had a near perfect memory, and had long since absorbed every detail of every case he’d ever given a second glance. He didn’t need a third body to connect the dots. He could recall the other nights and their victims too easily.

“You’re unmarried, Dr. Lecter,” Will pointed out needlessly during one of their ‘conversations,’ pacing the upper balcony of Hannibal’s office. He couldn’t be any closer to him, not for this. “Haven’t found your soulmate yet?”

Hannibal looked away from him, fidgeting with a pen on his desk, obsessively and uncharacteristically tidying it. “I met her back in Paris, while I was away at school,” he began. “She died while we were still both quite young, only connected for a brief time. A car accident.”

Will winced in sympathy. “That must have been painful.”

“Both physically and emotionally,” Hannibal agreed.

“What was her name?”

Hannibal looked away, expression pained. “Mischa,” He finally whispered. Later, Will would recognize this as the only lie Hannibal Lecter ever really told him. Hannibal preferred the manipulative games of half-truths and omissions, yet the pain on his face when he said her name, the tug in Will’s chest that he dismissed as empathy, were both very real.

These revelations were for another day, however. For the moment, Will leaned over the railing, eye on the ground instead of Hannibal.

“I’m sorry.”

Hannibal shook his head. “Pity has no place in our relationship, Will. It was a very long time ago in another life. I’m more interested in _your_ life, and the present time.”

Of course he was. Because this was therapy, or some facsimile of it. Will turned back to the books, skimming the titles without absorbing any of the words.

“You’ve never wanted to discuss soulmates before, Will. Tell me, have you found yours?”

Will took a deep breath, teetering on the edge of a precipice that could destroy him, words that clamored inside his skull, insisting on a reality Will wanted no part of.

“I think… I think my soulmate is the Chesapeake Ripper.”

\-----

Hannibal was long since used to keeping a steady facial expression and even temperament, even under severe stress. He was very fortunate to be able to do so even with the anxiety rolling off of Will in waves and the way Hannibal could feel a thick chunk of ice forming in his chest. Will. Impossibly brilliant Will.

“Do you hear his thoughts, then? Has he confessed to you?”

Will shook his head and laughed bitterly. “No. No, he would never tell me anything so.. personal. But I can feel him, when he kills. I know him as intimately as I know myself, better even.” The ice melted with a thick trace of pleasure, of the feeling of being _seen_. Will took a deep breath and forced himself to face Hannibal. “When we found Marissa Schurr, I knew. I knew before we saw her, before we ever arrived at the cabin, that the Ripper had claimed another victim.”

“You believe that the copycat killer and the Chesapeake Ripper are one and the same?” Hannibal asked with well-practiced skepticism.

Will shook his head. “Not believe. _Know_. When they disgust him I feel his wrath in every molecule of his being, and when he kills them...” Will choked, struggling to compose himself. “When he kills them, he’s so uplifted, so _elated._ I’ve never been… _He’s_ never been happier. And then they find the bodies. There’s always a body. I think the Ripper has killed a lot more people than they attribute to him.”

Where did Will end and Hannibal begin? The lines were beginning to blur, for both of them. Hannibal’s heart was racing with Will’s fear, and Will had been finding peace in the serenity of Hannibal’s kills.

“You worry what it would mean if you shared emotions with a killer.”

“I worry what it would mean if I _liked_ it,” Will spat. The words hung heavy in the air between them, Will’s face pale and haunted.

“Will. If your soulmate is indeed the Chesapeake Ripper, you are not to blame for his feelings.”

“But I _am_ to blame for my own.”

Hannibal could not, and _would not_ argue that point. They’d talked in circles around Will’s feelings about killing. He’d been beautiful when he killed Garrett Jacob Hobbs, rage and power and righteousness all heavy and hot in Hannibal’s chest. He wanted to see Will like that again, with blood on his hands and heat in his eyes. He wanted to set Will up like dominoes and give him that one gentle push into what he was meant to be.

“We cannot control the paths fate takes us down, Will. And perhaps your worries are unfounded. Best to sit back and watch for now, until you know more. Until you have something concrete to console yourself with.” He could see Will’s shoulders relaxing under Hannibal’s soothing tone, Will nodding along with thoughtful motions.

“Maybe I _am_ wrong,” Will offered, the desire plain on his face, “But if I’m not...”

“Then we will handle it together,” Hannibal said smoothly. “You will not be left alone in this.”

\-----

Despite what he and Hannibal had discussed, Will knew the truth. Somehow, he had always known. Something had always been very wrong with his soulmate. It was only recently that Will had finally been able to put the pieces together.

The Chesapeake Ripper case had obsessed him since he first heard of it, and now he knew why. The Ripper was inside of him, spliced into his DNA, mutating Will into a like-minded monster. Will wondered whether one of them had truly warped the other, or whether they had both been meant for darkness from the start.

The next time Will lay awake, haunted by unwanted ecstasy, he screwed up his courage and reached out. _‘Don’t. Please don’t.’_

His silent home stretched out around him, the dogs asleep, their snuffling and Will’s frantic breathing the only sound. He knew better than to think he hadn’t been heard. He was left waiting on purpose, tension tight in his chest.

‘ _Don’t what?’_ The question finally came, a hint of amusement.

‘ _I know what you’re doing_.’

‘ _Is that so? I’ve looked around and you don’t seem to be anywhere in the room, or are you next going to tell me you’ve picked up on my sight as well as my moods?’_

‘ _Don’t,’_ Will thought again, sharper this time, a bite to it. Far less pathetic than before, motivated by his own irritation. _‘You lie to everybody, I know you do, but don’t try to do it to me.’_

‘ _You seem very sure of yourself. Tell me, then, what is it you want me to stop?’_

‘ _You’re the Chesapeake Ripper.’_ In Hannibal’s office, Will had sounded hesitant, cautious. Alone in his home with only their thoughts to distract him, Will knew now that he was certain, that there had never been any other possibility. _‘The Chesapeake Ripper. The Copycat Killer. Maybe a few lesser murderers that no one’s linked to you yet, I’ve been feeling you for years. You’re a murderer and you’ve picked up your next victim.’_

Will had expected shock, or at the very least, a mild surprise. He didn’t get it. Instead, the amusement ramped up, until Will himself chuckled, alone in his home and horrified with himself.

‘ _You did wonder why I had no desire to meet you._ ’ The response chilled Will, made him curl up that much tighter in his thin sheets.

‘ _I told you I was a cop.’_

‘ _And a great deal more than that.’_

Will flinched as the truth of it grated his mind like sandpaper. He’d laid himself bare before his soulmate, spilled out little breadcrumbs of intimacy that would all slowly lead the Ripper out of the forest and straight to Will’s door. _‘And what did you make of it?’_ He made himself ask.

‘ _Are you asking me if I know your name, dear Will?’_

Will jerked back against his pillow, eyes flitting uselessly around the room, old habits from the NOPD flooding back. He checked each and every wide window, lingered on the door’s tiny lock. He’d hear anyone coming from miles away, and the dogs would be sure to alert him in any case, but once they were here, there was little in the way of construction that would keep them outside of Will’s home.

It took a long moment of his heart racing before the white noise of his thoughts crystallized once more. The lullaby, sweet and soft and achingly familiar by now, filling the place of the vanished amusement.

“ _Don’t,”_ Will said stiffly, both out loud and to the voice.

‘ _It soothes you_.’

‘ _I don’t want to be soothed!’_ There was no way to spin it that sounded anything but childish. Will flushed and ducked his head, though he knew it was unseen.

‘ _No, I don’t suppose you would.’_ And there was that amusement again, as if Will was a child’s toy, wind him up and watch him go. _‘But I told you before, didn’t I, Will? I’ve no desire to meet you, not even now. You can sleep safe in your bed, knowing that I’ve no desire to make you one of my victims right now.’_

Will could hear the soft _clop_ of hooves through the dirt, the stag outside his window casting shadows into the room. He swallowed heavily. _‘You’re specific in your honesty. At what point does that desire change?’_

‘ _At the point where you force my hand,’_ The Ripper told him forcefully, _‘But I meant it when I said it. It would be unpleasant if you disappeared.’_

‘ _So my life is forfeit if your freedom is,’_ Will summed up.

‘ _It matters not. You’ve stepped no closer to me by knowing. I’m very well practiced, Will, moreso than you are.’_

‘ _You killed before the Ripper, didn’t you.’_

‘ _I was already lost to you when you first became aware of me.’_ That stung, deep inside of Will, harder than it had any right to. It wasn’t only his own bitterness, he realized, hand clutched against his chest, but the Ripper’s as well.

‘ _It wasn’t my fault that I wasn’t there sooner.’_

‘ _Nor is it your fault that I am what I am. You did not make me, Will, nor the lack of you._ **_I_ ** _made me.’_ Irritated. Proud. A jumble of emotions all boiling down to a very insistent determination that Will would be _rude_ to claim responsibility for the Ripper. It should not have been a relief. It was the most relieved Will had felt in a long time.

‘ _Don’t,’_ Will tried one more time, then laughed with the Ripper’s amusement.

‘ _My dear Will, you’ve bitten off more than you can chew.’_

‘ _Please.’_

‘ _Why?’_

Will frowned, brow furrowed. _‘Because-’_

‘ _Don’t tell me ‘because it’s wrong,’ you’re smarter than that, better than that.’_

‘ _You don’t care if it’s wrong.’_

‘ _Morality is subjective. I’ve never killed anything that didn’t deserve it.’_

‘ _By your standards.’_

‘ _Who else’s standards should we live by, if not our own? Do you follow others like a sheep, or do you forge your own path?’_

‘ _I don’t want to feel it,’_ Will admitted, hiding his face in his pillow. He could feel the spiked thorns of antlers under his skin, caging him in, twining him forever with this blackened creature. Binding them more thoroughly than any rope.

‘ _Yet I can think of nothing in the world I’d rather share with you more. You once expressed a desire to know me. Were it possible, I’d have you know every piece.’_

There were no more words that night. Nor was there sleep. Will laid awake in his bed, his heart thrumming with an aching joy and lips spread into a smile he would deny to anyone who asked. The knowing was a painful agony, and yet, when he closed his eyes, Will saw Garrett Jacob Hobbs and the pleasure and power that had been entirely his own.

\-----

Will was bleeding into him, hemorrhaging his life into every corner of Hannibal’s brain, in more ways than one.

He’d tried again to beg Hannibal off of killing. Only once, and little more than halfheartedly. It was like he forgot that Hannibal could feel just as much as he could, could feel the faint tendrils of curiosity slowly strangling Will’s feeble sense of morality. He knew what Will felt when Hannibal killed. Just as he knew that Will was dreaming of it, that his own desires were flooding his senses and waking him with the need to reach out.

Just as he knew that Will Graham had encephalitis.

Their connection had finally been enough to urge Hannibal into a bit of research on soul mates and just how far their connection could go. It was all in the brain, of course, and studied as easily as any other matter of the brain. Which was to say, not very easily at all, and for everything they knew, there were dozens they didn’t. But science could point to which parts of the brain lit up when sending feelings back and forth, and just where the ability to connect was based. It was this knowledge that kept Hannibal from panic the first time he woke to antlers pinning him to his bed and the ghost of an animal’s breath on his skin.

He still felt a mild thrash of alarm, to be sure, but he knew his own mind. He knew he was not prone to hallucinations, visual or otherwise. He also knew Will, who as of late was frequently damp with the heat of a fever, who smelled slightly sweet beneath his normal musk.

So, encephalitis, then, and far enough in its progress to slide through into Hannibal’s mind as well, shared between the two of them. Hannibal learned to recognize periods of an unusual, dull buzz in the back of his mind as Will dissociating, losing time. It was an opening he would be remiss in not taking, a chance to direct Will further away from the identity of the Chesapeake Ripper. Will would be safe in Chilton’s care, physically at least. Locked up somewhere Hannibal could always find him, never out of reach and never close enough to peel away the skin of Hannibal’s person suit and leave him bared to the world, exposed to Jack Crawford and the FBI. Hannibal could continue his life without worry of being caught, there were no others who could ever know him the way Will knew him.

And yet.

The feathered stag took up residence in Hannibal’s office, looming behind him like a shadow. How very rare, to be able to study the progressive effects of encephalitis, but as Will’s brain lit ablaze, Hannibal found no satisfaction in it. It was frustrating, to hear a shriek interrupt his therapy sessions and have to wonder if he should acknowledge it, if his patient had heard it as well, but that was not what sucked the joy from him.

There was no enjoyment in Will’s fear, in the thick cloying agony that had started to seep into his dreams and his every waking moment. No joy, even, in the way Will’s inhibitions might be lowered, not when countered with the way their connection was slowly eroding from the fever. Will felt distant, now, just beyond his reach.

Hannibal found he hated it, and there was nothing that might relieve the stress of that fury.

\-----

Tobias Budge was obvious from the start, in a way that was almost disappointing in its simplicity. He _looked_ like a serial killer, for all Will knew that wasn’t a real thing. There was something dead in his eyes, icy and cold and not all there. Will knew before he really _knew_ , although to be fair, coming back into the building to two fresh corpses might have given it away if he hadn’t.

He was strong enough, as well, to have managed the human cello. Strong enough to leave battle scars on Will’s skin. For one long moment, hand at the level of his eyes and sharp stinging where the flesh of his wrist was starting to give way, Will thought that was it. This was how he died.

‘ _Don’t you dare.’_ It was not Will’s thought, but the ferocity in it was something Will could borrow. He shot Budge’s ear off, deafening them both, and nearly lost his footing when Budge threw him aside. He couldn’t follow after him fast enough, ears ringing, balance lost. Will wanted to give up and lie down.

‘ _Not dead,’_ He sent, distracted and pained. Budge would be on the move, but Will didn’t think he’d be heading out of town. There would be somewhere else he had to be, something else he had to do.

Halfway out the door, Will realized that the something would take him straight to Hannibal, and started to run, jumbled thoughts trying to connect to each other and not quite making it. Not yet.

Will moved as fast as he could, thoughts racing, always racing. There was no surprise coming through his brain, but a sharp stinging pain caught across his wrists anyway. Sharp, familiar, and not Will’s. By the time he reached Hannibal’s office, heart pounding, body aching, the pieces had begun to fall into place.

Budge was already dead, already being poked and prodded by an unfamiliar officer. Hannibal was talking to Jack, collapsed at his desk and bleeding from places that ached tenderly against Will’s skin. Will knew where the marks would be without having to look. He stopped short, let the veil fall from his eyes, and met his soulmate’s gaze with a shared agony.

“I thought he was going to kill you.” Hannibal said it out loud, and in Will’s head. Will echoed it. Their thoughts were merging, blurring.

‘ _It’s you, it’s always been you.’_ Somebody. Maybe Will. Maybe Hannibal, who looked like he’d had a revelation, who’s heartbeat was echoing in Will’s teeth.

The office was teeming with law enforcement. Jack Crawford was mere feet from Hannibal. If Will said something, Hannibal might have been able to take a few good people down with him, but it was unlikely he’d manage an escape.

And then he’d be out of Will’s sight, out of his reach, back to the empty shadow of a connection, back to reaching out for someone who did not reach back. Hannibal would never kill again, would never fill Will with that aching ecstatic joy.

‘ _See?’_ Whispered Garrett Jacob Hobbs. _‘See?_ ’

Hannibal looked resigned. Wilted. Certain of his fate, and yet the relief he had felt when Will walked in was still scrawled across his face. Beating in Will’s chest.

Something inside Will broke. Shattered.

Came back together.

It would have taken three extra steps to walk around the desk. Will went over it anyway, shoving Hannibal’s chair back and forcing his way into his space, standing, but just barely. Hannibal’s lap was looking more and more inviting.

Hannibal welcomed him with open arms, with an open, aching need that might have been his, might have been Will’s. It didn’t matter anymore.

Somewhere beyond their line of sight, Jack made a confused, startled sound. Will drowned it out with the sound of a shared heartbeat and kissed Hannibal like they were dying, like he’d left his own body back in Budge’s basement.

‘ _Never again. Don’t ever push me away again.’_

‘ _Never,’_ Hannibal swore just as fiercely, amazement and shock and more of that cold relief. Will kissed him again just to feel a flare of shared joy burst up in his chest, then a third time. Might have managed a fourth time if Jack hadn’t cleared his throat behind him.

Hannibal’s hands tightened, one on Will’s hip, one in his hair. A hint of sheepishness swirled between the two of them, squashed by amused triumph. Will glanced over his shoulder.

“How long has this been going on?” Jack asked.

They glanced at each other, then back at Jack. “About thirty seconds,” Will told him, “We had...a bit of a miscommunication before.”

Hannibal straightened up, pulling his hands away. “I’m afraid, Jack, that now that I’m aware Will is my soulmate, it would be unethical to continue monitoring his mental health for you.”

Jack stared at them for a long moment, and then rubbed at his eyes with a sigh. “It’s been a really long day,” He said, glancing away. “We can talk about all of this tomorrow.”

Will started nodding almost before Jack had finished speaking. A hysterical laugh bubbled up in Will’s chest, but spilled from Hannibal’s lips as a soft chuckle. They were echoing each other, reverberating back and forth in an ever increasing feedback loop. Will nearly tumbled over himself on the way out the door, and let Hannibal lead him to his car.

“I think I knew,” He told Hannibal from the passenger seat of the Bentley. Hannibal’s hands tensed slightly on the steering wheel, and then relaxed when he remembered Will was no danger to him. “Or suspected. Some part of me recognized you.”

“I knew the second I met you,” Hannibal told him quietly. Will wanted to be mad, sought out anger deep within himself, and failed to find any.

“I think I’m mad at you for that,” He said anyway. Hannibal smiled at him, all teeth and danger, and it made Will’s whole body heat up, heart pounding.

“You’re not.”

Will laughed and shook his head. “No. No I’m not.” He frowned, reaching out to whack at Hannibal’s shoulder. “I will be, though, if you try anything like it again.”

“No more secrets,” Hannibal promised, and Will found he believed him.

They barely made it through the door of Hannibal’s home before Will had him up against it. He could feel everything, pressed up against Hannibal like this, more than he’d ever felt before. Hannibal’s answering grin was feral. Will wanted to kiss it off of him. Will wanted to stare at it for hours, attach Hannibal’s features to every memory he had of his soulmate.

“I’m not going to stop,” Hannibal warned him. Will’s answer surprised both of them, sharp and cold between them.

“I don’t want you to stop.”

Hannibal shoved him forward, up against the wall this time, a kiss that was more of a bite, a hunger that had built for almost two decades.

“I don’t want you to stop,” Will repeated, gasping against Hannibal’s mouth, “I should, I know I should, but the way you feel when you- Hannibal!”

Will was losing his mind. He had to be. He felt like he was going to burst into flames, every place where Hannibal touched him was its own fire. And then Hannibal groaned, pushed forward, and the places they _didn’t_ touch were suddenly much easier to count.

“Move,” Will demanded, shoving Hannibal back with a firm hand on his chest. “Bed.”

They made it up the stairs and down the hall somehow. Will wasn’t entirely sure how, lost in the shape of Hannibal, in a thousand tiny details that had never been worth noticing before. The bedroom was big, over-decorated and pretentious, and Will didn’t notice a single part of it. He backed Hannibal up to the bed with a hand on his side and teeth against his throat, tracing the line of his pulse with his tongue. Somewhere between the door and the bed, Hannibal managed to urge him out of his clothes.

It was different with skin. Will braced himself on all fours over Hannibal, Hannibal arched up beneath him, the heat of him pressed hard against Will’s thigh, and then neither of them knew who they were anymore.

They could feel everything, a shared burn pushed and pulled back and forth between the two of them. Hannibal linked their hands together, drew them up along the length of the bed until Will lost his balance and pressed flush against his skin.

This was better. This exceeded desperate kisses in the office, in the doorway. Heat curled into their stomachs, into the flush of their skin where they ground against each other. Whole, finally, as they were meant to be, heart to heart, bodies intertwined. Will ground down against Hannibal, gasping as Hannibal sucked a mark against his collarbone. Somebody moaned. Will worked a hand between the two of them, guiding his cock along the line of Hannibal’s. He hadn’t even looked, he realized, too distracted with filling up his other senses. He didn’t look now, closing his eyes tight against the world, licking his way into Hannibal’s mouth until he felt the sharp bite of teeth on his tongue.

“It won’t last,” Hannibal murmured against his mouth.

“Then we’ll do it again.”

Hannibal trailed a hand down Will’s back, cupping his ass and guiding his next few thrusts with sure, steady fingers. Will followed his lead, letting the pleasure roll through him, his and Hannibal’s, intertwined and unyielding, a constant roll of arousal that sparked deep in Will’s brain and lit up every one of his senses. Will rocked his hips once, twice, and then was gone, shaking through his climax, thrusts sloppy and uneven as his release spread between them. Hannibal shuddered against him, gripping Will’s hips with tight hands as he forced Will to keep moving against him, until Will felt his climax like his own, crying out as Hannibal’s orgasm ripped through them both.

Will collapsed onto Hannibal’s chest, panting slightly and trying to piece himself back together. His face was flushed with exertion, and a bit of embarrassment. Things hadn’t been that quick since he was a teenager, although technically, he was blaming Hannibal for almost two decades of build-up.

Hannibal tensed beneath him, and Will glanced up as a tinge of uneasiness tugged at his chest. Hannibal, as far as Will could tell, was not capable of looking guilty, but he seemed to be attempting it. Will could recognize the tightening feeling in his chest.

“I should probably tell you that you have encephalitis.”

“What,” Will said flatly, pushing away from Hannibal to sit up straight on the mussed bedspread.

“It’s an infection in your brain. It can cause fevers, hallucinations...”

“What?” Will repeated, higher this time. Hannibal hushed him, straightening up and carding a hand through his curls.

“It’s curable. Completely curable.”

“How did you…?”

“I could smell it on you. And… your hallucinations were beginning to bleed through.”

Will stared at him for a long moment and then groaned, hiding his face in his hands. “God damn it, Hannibal.”

“It’s curable,” Hannibal repeated, as if that made any of this better.

“I thought I was crazy! I thought I was losing my mind.”

“I may have encouraged that.”

Will glared at him through his fingers. “I hate you.”

“You don’t,” Hannibal said, with an entirely inappropriate smile. Will reached out and smacked his shoulder.

“If you _ever_ do something like that again, you’re going to show up as the Ripper’s final victim.”

Hannibal’s smile grew teeth, sharp and pleased and proud. Will groaned and smacked him again.

“Stop that. I’m not kissing you again until you get me antibiotics.”

“Of course, dear Will.”

“ _He's more myself than I am. Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.”_ _-Emily Bronte, ‘Wuthering Heights’_

**Author's Note:**

> Major thank yous to both [Immamortician](https://immamortician.tumblr.com/) and [threewick](https://archiveofourown.org/users/threewick/pseuds/threewick) for beta reading this for me while I panicked about my own questionable decision making skills.
> 
> I don't know guys, I don't write smut, I prefer to fade to black like a Harlequin romance, so I hope you like it!
> 
> (Also I don't speak Lithuanian oops let's hope google didn't fail me)
> 
> ((Also Also Wuthering Heights would make a fantastic Hannigram AU setting fight me.))
> 
> Come follow me on [Tumblr](http://stratumgermanitivum.tumblr.com) for Hannibal flailing and fic progress updates.


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